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AUTHOR: 


LEVICK 


J  AM 


SJ 


TITLE: 


EARLY  FRlb:>iDS  AND 
THEIR 

PLACE: 

PHILADELPHIA 

DA  TE : 

1883 


COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARIES 
PRESERVATION  DEPARTMENT 


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Levick,    JariK^s    J  .  ;qi  .jamo::^    Jone'^  ),  ;:d  182-1 -1:393  . 
Ihe    eariv   h  fiends   and    thcii     services    in    (^uner  i  caphi  nu  er  of  orfii] . 
ess    read    i^efoie    ]  lie    Friends'    insLiFute    tor     Young    rien ,    F'liiladeU 
nd   month    IS.    1883, kbv    James    J.    Levick. 
^^0  l-'hi  ladeiphia,  rM\!ni.    !- .    F'l  i  -  .  *  cib83. 

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THE 


EARLY  FRIl-NDS 


AND 


THHIR  SER\'ICES  l.\  AMERICA. 


AN     ADDRESS     READ     BHFoRK 


THE   FRIENDS^   INSTITUTE   FOR   YOUNG   MEN, 


PHILADELPHIA, 


Second  Month  15,  1883, 


By   JAMES    J.    LEVICK.    M.   D. 


Pll  I  LADEl.  I'H  1  A: 
WM.    H.    PILE,    PRINTER,    4-22    WALNUT    STREET 

1883. 


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Two  hundred  and  thirty-nve  years  ago  the  Religious  Society 
of  Friends  began  to  be  known  in  England.  Two  hundred 
years  ago  this  Province  wa.>  first  settled  by  William  Penn. 
Of  the  latter  event  we  have  lately  heard  much,  of  the  former 
but  little  ;  and  yet  the  latter  was  so  much  the  natural  sequence 
of  the  former,  that  the  history  of  the  one  is  incomplete  with- 
out the  history  of  the  other. 

I  propose,  therefore,  this  evening  to  speak  of  three  men, 
each  of  whom  was  prominent  in  the  early  history  of  the 
Society  of  Friends,  and  each  of  whom  had  somewhat  to  do 
with  the  settlement  of  Pennsylvania  and  its  vicinity.  I  allude 
to  George  Fox,  Robert  Barclay  and  William  Penn. 

I  am  well  aware  that  to  some  who  are  present  this  account 
will  have  for  them  all  the  familiarity  of  a  thrice-told  tale.  1 
cannot  but  believe  that  to  others,  and  especially  to  the  younger 
members  of  this  Institute,  there  will  be  some  facts  mentioned 
which  are  new  to  them,  and  I  am  strong  in  the  conviction 
that  it  will  do  no  harm  to  any  of  us  often  to  be  reminded 
what  manner  of  men  they  were  to  whom  as  Friends,  and  as 
Pennsvlvanians,  we  owe  so  much.  • 

George  Fox  was  born  in  Leicestershire,  England,  in  the 
month  called  July,  1624.  He  had  a  good  ancestry,  for  his 
father  was  a  man  whose  honesty  was  proverbial,  and  his  mother 
was  of  the  stock  of  the  martyrs.  His  school  education  was 
but  moderate,  and  yet  he  wa>  by  no  means  ignorant  or  illiterate. 
He  was  carefully  brought  up  in  the  faith  and  practices  of  the 
Church  of  England,  to  whose  communion  his  parents  belonged, 
and  of  which  it  was  at  one  time  proposed  he  should  become  a 
clergyman.     This,  however,  was  objected  to  by  some  of  his 


333603 


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o 


family,  and  it  ended  in  his  being  apprenticed,  as  he  writes,  to 
*'  a  man  who  was  a  shoemaker  by  trade,"  though  it  does  not 
appear  that  George  Fox  himself  ever  belonged  to  what  our 
poet,  Whittier,  calls  "  the  gentle  craft  of  leather,"  for,  as  Fox 
says  of  his  master,  "  He  dealt  in  wool  and  used  grazing,  and 
sold  cattle,  and  a  great  deal  of  it  went  through  my  hands."' 

As  his  childhood  had  been  a  remarkably  grave  and  staid 
one,  so  his  youth  was  one  of  great  innocency  and  purity.  At 
twenty  years  of  age  grave  and  perplexing  questions,  doubts 
and  temptations,  pressed  heavily  upon  him.  The  mysteries 
of  this  life  and  of  the  life  to  come  enshrouded  his  mind  in 
much  darkness,  and  were  accompanied  with  a  state  of  unrest 
from  which  he  vainly  sought  relief.  Various  were  the  sug- 
gestions made  to  him  at  this  time  by  his  relatives.  One  who 
knew  the  steadying  influence  of  a  good  wife,  advised  him  to 
marry  ;  but,  says  he,  "  I  told  him  I  was  but  a  lad,  and  must 
hrst  learn  wisdom."  Another  bade  him  join  the  auxiliary 
band  among  the  soldiers;  "but  I  refused,  and  was  grieved 
that  they  proffered  such  things  to  me,  being  a  tender  youth." 
And  so,  his  relatives  proving  no  help  to  him,  he  turned, 
almost  in  despair,  to  "the  priests,"  whom,  however,  he  found 
to  be  "  miserable  comforters."  One  told  him  to  "  take  to- 
bacco and  sing  psalms."  "  Tobacco,"  he  says,  "  was  a  thing 
1  did  not  love,  and  I  was  not  in  an  estate  to  sing — I  could 
not  sing."  One  made  his  troubles  the  sport  of  his  servants; 
while  another,  whose  conversation  at  first  gave  him  some 
encouragement,  flew  into  such  a  violent  passion  when  young 
Fox  accidentally  set  his  foot  on  the  side  of  a  flower-bed,  that 
he  went  away  in  sorrow,  worse  than  when  he  came. 

By  this  time  certain  thoughts,  which  before  had  been  vague, 
now  began  to  assume  a  definite  form  and  shape.  Very  inter- 
esting is  to  note  the  gradual  manner  in  which  great  truths 
dawned  upon  him.  Among  the  very  first  of  these  "heavenly 
openings,"  as  he  deemed  them,  one  is  thus  recorded  by  him: 

'  William  Penn  says  of  him,  "  As  fi)r  his  employment,  he  was  brought 
up  to  country  business,  and  took  most  delight  in  sheep,  and  was  very 
skilful  in  them,  an  employment  tliat  well  suited  his  mind  in  several  re- 
>j^ects,  both  for  its  innocency  and  solitude,  and  was  a  just  figure  of  his  after 
ministrv  and  service." 


1 


"As  I  was  walking  in  the  field  on  a  First-day  morning,  the 
Lord  opened  to  me,  that  being  bred  at  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge was  not  enough  to  fit  and  qualifie  men  to  be  ministers 
of  Christ."  "And,"  says  he,  in  his  quaint  language,  "I 
stranged  at  it,  for  it  was  the  common  belief  of  the  people  ;  but 
I  saw  it  clearly,  and  was  satisfied,  and  admired  the  goodness 
of  the  Lord  who  had  opened  this  thing  unto  me. "  At  another 
time,  he  writes,  "It  was  opened  in  me  that  God,  who  made 
the  world,  dwelleth  not  in  temples  made  vvith  hands.  This 
at  first  semed  a  strange  word,  *  *  but  the  Lord  showed 
me  that  He  did  not  dwell  in  temples  which  man  had  com- 
manded and  set  up,  but  in  people's  hearts."  And  then,  rap- 
idly following  this,  came  the  revelation.  'There  is  an  anoint- 
ing within  man,  and  God  will  teach  his  peoj^le  Himself.'  " 

Closely  allied  to  this,  if  not  identical  with  it,  was  opened 
to  his  view,  in  the  vale  of  Beavor,  "  how  that  every  man  was 
enlightened  by  the  Divine  light  of  Christ,  and  that  they  who 
believed  in  it  came  out  of  condemnation  and  came  to  the 
light  of  life,  and  became  the  children  of  it ;  but  that  they 
that  hated  it  and  did  not  believe  in  it,  were  condemned  by 
it,  though  they  made  a  profession  of  Christ." 

Having  had  little  comfort  from  the  priests  of  the  Established 
Church,  he  turned  his  attention  to  the  dissenting  people, 
among  w-hom  he  found,  as  he  writes,  "  some  tenderness ;" 
"but  as  I  had  forsaken  the  priests,  so  I  left  the  separate 
preachers,  for  I  saw  there  was  none  among  them  that  could 
speak  to  my  condition.  And  when  all  hope  in  them  and  in 
all  men  was  gone,  so  that  I  had  nothing  outwardly  to  help 
me,  then,  oh,  then  I  I  heard  a  voice  which  said,  there  is  One 
even  Christ  Jesus,  which  can  speak  to  thy  condition.  Then 
the  Lord  did  let  me  see  why  there  was  none  upon  the  earth 
that  could  speak  to  my  condition,  namely,  that  I  might  give 
Him  all  the  glory." 

I  have  quoted  largely  George  Fox's  own  words,  because 
they  are  necessary  fully  to  understand  the  character  of  the 
man,  and  because  on  them  and  what  they  express,  hinged,  as 
it  were,  his  whole  subsequent  life,  his  teaching  and  his  preach- 
ing. "After  this,"  says  he,  "all  things  were  new,  and  all 
the  creation  gave  another  smell  to  me  than  before,  beyond 


f; 


what  words  can  utter. ' '  And  now,  with  all  the  earnestness  ot 
undoubting  conviction,  he  recognizes  fully  his  call  to  preach 
the  Gospel  to  his  fellow  men.  First  appearing  as  such  in  the 
year  1647,  when  but  twenty-three  years  old,  his  progress  as 
a  preacher  is  a  rapid  one.  Even  before  the  organization  ot 
the  Society  of  Friends  as  such,  he  travelled  largely  in  the 
north  of  England,  and  found  tender-hearted  people  who  heard 
with  gladness  his  gospel  message,  which  they  freely  owned, 
and  to  which  they  found  an  answer  in  their  hearts  and 
enlightened  consciences. 

For  this  was  a  time,  if  ever  so  in  its  history,  that  the 
religious  mind  of  the  English  people  was  stirred  to  its  very 
depths.  The  execution  of  King  Charles,  the  rule  of  Cromwell, 
followed  by  his  death,  and  the  short-lived  protectorate  of  his 
>on,  soon  succeeded  by  the  restoration  of  the  Stuarts,  had 
produced  a  sense  of  insecurity  among  all  the  people. 

To  this  was  added,  during  the  times  we  are  considering,  the 
prevalence  of  that  fearful  pestilence  known  as  the  Plague.  It 
is  at  such  a  time  as  this,  when  every  earthly  prop  seems  to  be 
insecure,  that  the  soul,  almost  in  despair,  certainly  with  great 
eagerness,  grasps  at  whatever  gives  promise  of  real  support. 
For  these  among  other  reasons  was  it  that  so  many  of  the 
people  heard  George  Fox's  gospel  message,  nnd  n^nnv  of  them 
gladly  received  it. 

And  now,  before  passing  further,  it  may  be  well  to  ask,  what, 
was  this  gospel  message,  and  what  were  some  of  the  religious 
views  of  George  Fox  and  the  early  Friends? 

I  think  this  message  may  all  be  epitomized  in  his  own 
words:  ''I  saw  that  Christ  died  for  all  men,  and  had 
enlightened  all  men  and  women  with  his  divine  and  saving 
licrht,   and  that  no  man   could   be   a   true   believer  but  who 

believed  in  it." 

1  have  said  that  his  whole  gospel  message  might  be  epito- 
mized in  these  words,  and  I  repeat  it  ;  but  it  will  be  seen  that 
few  as  they  are,  these  two  propositions  cover  the  whole  field 
of  Christian  faith.  They  are,  however,  inseparable  one  from 
the  other,  and  George  Fox  did  not  separate  them.  He  held 
in  all  its  fulness  the  doctrine  of  the  i)ropitiatory  offering  of 
Christ  on  Calvary ;  and  he  recognized    in  all   its  force,   the 


) 


doctrine  of  Christ  as  the  Light  which  lighteth  every  man  that 
Cometh  into  the  world. 

I  need  not  adduce  any  lengthened  evidence  to  prove  to  this 
audience  the  first  of  these  statements.  Its  truth  is  to  be  found 
all  the  way  through  his  Journal,  which  is  the  reflex  of  his  faith 
and  of  his  life. 

Very  early  in  his  history,  when  but  little  more  than  twenty- 
one  years  old  he  records  that,  "the  priest  of  Drayton  aske<l 
me  a  question,  viz.  :  why  Christ  cried  out  on  the  cross.  My 
God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me?  And  why  He 
said.  If  it  be  possible,  let  this  cup  pass  from  me  ;  yet  not  my 
will,  but  thine  be  done?  And  I  told  him,"  says  Fox,  ''  that 
at  that  time  the  sins  of  mankind  were  upon  Him,  and  their 
iniquities  and  transgressions  with  which  He  was  wounded,  which 
He  was  to  bear,  and  to  be  an  offering  for  them,  as  He  was 
man ;  but  died  not,  as  He  was  God.  And  so  in  that  He  died 
for  all  men,  and  tasted  death  for  every  man.  He  was  an  offering 
for  the  sins  of  the  whole  world."  And  the  priest  said  it  was 
a  very  good,  full  answer,  and  such  an  one  as  he  had  not  heard. 

Another  record  in  his  Journal  reads  thus  :  "  When  in  Darby 
dungeon,  A.  D.  1651,  there  came  to  see  me  a  man  from 
Nottinghamshire,  a souldier,  and  with  him  came  several  others  ; 
and  in  discourse  this  person  said  :  Your  faith  stands  in  a  man 
that  died  at  Jerusalem,  and  there  never  was  any  such  thing. 
I  was  exceedingly  grieved  to  hear  him  say  so,  and  I  said  to 
him :  How !  did  not  Christ  suffer  without  the  gates  of 
Jerusalem  through  the  professing  Jews  and  Chief  Priests  and 
Pilate?  And  he  denied  that  ever  Christ  suffered  there  out- 
wardly. Then  I  asked  him  if  there  were  not  Jews  and  Chief 
Priests  and  Pilate  there  outwardly ;  and  when  he  could  not 
tleny  that,  I  told  him  as  certainly  as  there  was  a  Chief  Priest 
and  Jews  and  Pilate  there  outwardly,  so  certainly  was  Christ 
persecuted  by  them,  and  did  suffer  there  outwardly  under 
them.  Yet  from  this  man's  words  was  a  slander  raised  upon 
us,  that  the  Quakers  should  deny  Christ  that  suffered  and  died 
at  Jerusalem,  which  was  all  utterly  false,  and  the  least  thought 
of  it  never  entered  our  hearts ;  but  it  was  a  mere  slander  cast 
upon  us,  and  occasioned  by  this  person's  words." 

This  simple  faith  of  his  early  youth  never  forsook  George 


8 


Fox.  It  is  seen  all  through  the  pages  of  his  Journal,  and 
finds  its  strong  expression  in  that  remarkable  declaration  of 
faith  made  at  Barbadoes. 

This  faith,  I  repeat  it,  George  Fox  and  his  friends  held  in 
all  its  fulness  and  force;  but  this  was  not  all  that  they  held. 
Not  only  does  George  Fox  say,  "  I  saw  that  Christ  died  for 
all  men,"  but  he  also  says,  *'  I  saw  that  Christ  had  enlightened 
all  men  and  women  with  his  divine  and  saving  light."  This, 
which  William  Penn  calls  the  characteristic  doctrine  of  the 
Friends,  now  appears  in  almost  every  sermon,  epistle  and 
paper  put  forth  by  George  Fox.  That  it  was  thus  prominently 
put  forward  was  doubtless  due  to  the  fact  that  the  great  doc- 
trine of  the  Atonement  was  generally  accepted  by  the  then 
Christian  world,  and  although  the  acceptance  of  it  was  mixed 
up  with  error,  there  was,  relatively,  but  little  necessity  for 
especially  pressing  it  upon  men's  attention  at  that  time.  But 
this,  to  them,  new  doctrine,  a  living,  present  Christ,  they 
preached  everywhere,  and,  I  may  add,  almost  everywhere 
''the  common  people  heard  them  gladly."  For  to  these 
people,  in  their  great  unrest,  there  came  with  this  doctrine  of 
direct  access  to  their  Saviour,  a  sense  of  rest  and  peace  and 
companionship,  for  which  they  had  long  earnestly  yearned, 
but  to  which  they  had  thus  far  been  strangers.  No  wonder 
that  the  people  heard  it  gladly  !  No  wonder,  too,  that  there 
soon  arose  that  fierce  spirit  of  persecution  against  those  who 
held  it,  taught  it,  and,  with  and  by  it,  drew  away  so  many 
from  their  old  forms  and  places  of  worship. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  among  these  persecutors  there 
were  two  distinct  classes.  One  class  who  fully  believed  that 
these  Quakers  were  pestilent  fellows  who  would  turn  the  world 
upside  down  by  what  they  taught,  and  who  honestly  thought 
they  were  doing  God  service  by  promptly  suppressing  them  ; 
and  another  cla.ss  who  early  saw  how  much  of  truth  there  was 
in  these  principles,  and  how,  carried  to  their  full  development, 
they  might  forever  put  an  end  to  all  absolute  necessity  for 
pope,  for  priest,  for  preacher.  And  hence  with  the  instinct 
of  self-preservation,  as  it  were,  in  a  struggle  for  life  itself,  they 
strove  at  once  and  forever,  to  crush  them. 

And  yet  these  primitive  Friends  very  early  recognized  the 


aid  to  the  Church  of  rightly  qualified  ministers  of  the  gospel. 
While  they  believed  and  taught  that  this  Light  shone  in  every 
heart,  they  remembered  that  at  times  it  shined  in  darkness, 
and  the  darkness  comprehended  it  not.  They  well  knew  that 
there  was  a  vast  difference  in  degree  between  its  feeble  flicker- 
ing in  some  hearts  and  the  full  blaze  of  its  effulgence  in  others. 
They  knew  that  with  many  an  awakened  mind  in  the  first 
dawnings  of  this  light,  the  Christian's  step  was  often  an  uncer- 
tain and  an  unsteady  one,  and  that  as  with  the  Ethiopian  of 
old,  whom  Philip  met,  it  was  both  right  and  helpful  that 
some  man  should  guide  him. 

Out  of  this  doctrine  of  an  indwelling  Christ  came,  as  a 
natural  sequence,  all  their  distinctive  doctrines.  If  He  were 
in  every  heart, — if  men  had  in  them  the  Real  Presence,  it  fol- 
lowed that  all  mere  types  and  shadows  of  that  Real  Presence 
were  unnecessary.  This  doctrine,  if  accepted,  at  once  did 
awav  with  all  need  for  the  rites  and  ceremonies  of  the  Church, 
as  it  is  called.  The  early  Quakers  recognized  the  necessity 
of  baptism,  but  it  was  a  baptism  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  They 
loved  to  partake  of  the  communion,  but  it  was  to  them  an 
inward  and  spiritual  feast.  They  recognized  the  value  of  a 
rightly  ordained  ministry,  but  they  taught  that  its  lessons  must 
be  learned  in  a  higher  school  than  Oxford  or  Cambridge,  and 
that  having  been  freely  received  they  must  be  freely  given. 

All  that  was  distinctive  in  their  views  respecting  the  ministry 
came  of  the  doctrine  we  have  been  considering,  an  inward 
revelation,  qualifying,  guiding,  directing  for  this  service  :  not 
a  natural  principle  like  reason  or  conscience,  capable  of  being 
cultivated  by  individuals  themselves,  influenced  by  their  sur- 
roundings, moulded  by  their  education,  but  a  direct  gift  to 
their  souls,  unerring  in  its  guidance,  infallible  in  its  teachings, 
— an  emanation  from  God  himself. 

To  teach  is  one  thing,  to  preach  another,  and  it  is  only 
from  the  standpoint  of  what  constitute  the  qualifications 
for,  and  the  requirements  of  a  preacher,  that  their  views 
respecting  pecuniary  compensation  for  preaching  can  be 
rightly  understood.  By  years  of  careful  study  and  research 
good  men  may  make  themselves  familiar  with  great  Scriptural 
facts,  maybe  able  to  explain  parts  of  the  Bible  which  to  many 


10 

minds  are  obscure,  may  be  helpful   in  many  ways  to  others. 
For  this  and  for  the  pastoral  services  required  of  them,  the 
care  of  the  sick,  the  visits  to  the  afflicted,  the  general  over- 
sight of  the  flock,  engagements  may  be  made  and  pecuniary 
compensation   may  be  offered.      He   would   be  a   bold   man, 
indeed,  who  would  dare  to  say  that  such  teaching  and  such 
services  may  not  receive  the  Divine  blessing.     But  these'early 
Quakers  did   not  regard   this  as   preaching,  or  these   as  the 
qualifications  of  a  preacher,  who,  as  they  believed,  could  only 
preach  when   he  received    immediately  the   Divine   authority 
and  the  Divine  command,  whi(  h  latter  he  could  no  more  dis- 
obey than  he  could  presumptuousl\  demand  the  former.     Hence 
he  could  make  no  contract  with  others,  or  engagement  to  preach 
at  stated  times,  as  he  knew  not  at  what  time  this  qualification 
to  preach  might  be  given  him,  or  when  it  might  be  withheld; 
and  he  no  more  claimed  payment  for  this  which  he  gave  to 
others,  but  which  had  first  been  given  to  him,  than  did  the 
disciples  of  old  demand  money  of  the  multitude  who  were  fed 
with  the  five  barley  loaves  and  the  few  small  fishes,  which  owed 
all  their  sustaining  virtue  to  Him  who  first  blessed  and   brake 
the  bread  and  handed   it  to  his  disciples,;  who  then,  but  not 
till  then,  handed  it  to  the  famishing  multitude. 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  with  referenc  e  to  the  doctrine  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  in  the  heart,  that  the  whole  superstructure  of  the 
distinctive  doctrines  of  these  early  Friends  was  built  on  this 
foundation  ;  but,  I  repeat  it,  this  foundation  itself,  was  in- 
separably connected  with  the  rock  on  which  it  rested,  and 
that  rock  was  Christ,  and  any  attempt  to  separate  this  founda- 
tion from  this  rock,  while  it  cannot  weaken  the  foundation, 
or  move  the  rock,  cannot  fail  to  put  in  jeopardy  the  building, 
and  to  endanger  him  who  attempts  it. 

The  Friends  very  early  bore  their  testimony  against  all 
swearing,  a  testimony  of  which  their  enemies  took  great  ad- 
vantage in  those  troublous  times,  when  rulers  were  so  often 
changed,  tendering  them  the  oath  of  allegiance,  and  because 
they  would  not  take  it,  or  any  oath,  sending  them  to  jail  as 
persons  disaffected  and  dangerous  to  those  in  authority.  And 
yet  surely  none  of  their  testimonies  had  firmer  foundation  than 
this  had.    The  command  of  our  Saviour  is  so  emj^hatic,  "*  Swear 


11 


not  at  all,"  that  it  is  surprising  it  should  ever  have  been  dis- 
regarded by  Christians.  Aside  from  this,  and  from  the  flippant 
manner  in  which  it  is  so  often  taken,  has  it  ever  occurred  to 
you,  my  young  friends,  what  a  dangerous  presumption  attache> 
to  the  concluding  words  of  the  legal  oath,  which  indeed  con- 
stitute its  very  essence,  the  words  "So  help  me  God,"  "so, 
{iHid  not  other^vise.)  may  God  help  me." 

Can  there  be  a  more  dangerous  presumption  than  this,  that 
a  poor,  weak,  sinful  man,  whose  memory  may  be  treacherous, 
whose  mind  may  be  confused,  whose  temptation  may  over- 
come him,  should  dare,  as  it  were,  to  bargain  with  the  Al- 
mighty, and  to  ask,  in  any  contingency  whatever,  to  be  cut 
off  from  that  hope  and  help  which  he  always  needs?  Surely 
too,  he  must  have  a  low  standard  of  truth  in  every-day  life 
who  needs  such  an  imprecation  as  this  is  to  make  him  tell  it 
at  any  time.  We  owe  to  these  early  Friends  the  substitution 
of  the  simple  affirmation,  which  is  now  steadily  and  surely  tak- 
ing the  place  of  the  legal  oath. 

To  the  early  testimony  of  the  Friends  against  all  wars  and 
fightings  may  be  traced  the  gradual  development  of  the  senti- 
ment which  shows  itself  in  that  remarkable  event  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century,  the  recommendation,  by  the  President 
of  the  United  States,  to  his  legislators,  and  to  all  Christian 
rulers,  that  peaceful  arbitration  should  take  the  place  of  the 
liloody  arbitrament  of  the  sword. 

The  early  Friends  always  regarded,  and  never  hesitated  to 
speak  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  as  the  words  of  God,  and  as  a 
precious  gift  from  Him  ;  but  they  did  not  apply  to  the  gift 
the  name  which  belonged  to  the  Giver,  retaining  that  name 
for  '' the  Word"  which  ''was  in  the  beginning;  was  with 
God.  and  was  God."  Large  opportunities  for  observation 
have  shown  me  that  there  is  no  body  of  Christians  who  hold 
the  Holy  Scriptures  in  a  truer  and  more  affectionate  regard 
than  do  the  Friends.  While  some  good  people,  not  all  by 
any  means,  are  content  to  hear  them  read  in  places  of  public 
worship,  the  religious  Society  of  Friends  enjoins  its  older 
members  both  to  read  the  Holy  Scriptures  frequently  them- 
selves, and  to  train  up  their  children  frequently  to  read  them 
also. 


1  "i  ■ 


12 


A  testimony  which  ga\c  the  early  Friends  much  trouble 
and,  indirectly  at  least,  sent  many  of  them  to  prison,  was  their 
refusal  to  take  off  the  hat  in  deference  to  the  presence  of  others, 
or  to  the  place  where  they  then  were.  Doubtless  it  has  often 
suggested  itself  to  you,  as  it  often  has  to  me,  that  as  the  hat 
was  made  to  protect  the  head  from  the  heat  or  the  cold,  it 
was  very  unnecessary  for  them  to  seem  to  court  punishment 
by  wearing  it  in  the  house.  William  Penn  says  ''religion 
makes  no  man  discourteous,  uncivil  or  unkind." 

The  early  Friends,  however,  were  among  the  first  to  pro- 
claim the  equality  of  men,  and  they  regarded  the  bowing  of 
the  body  and  the  taking  off  the  hat  to  their  tellows  as  incon- 
sistent with  this  great  principle.  But  during  all  rightly  author- 
ized  prayer  in  their  religious  meetings,  in  which  each  member 
is  regarded  as  participating,  they  devoutly  took  off  the  hat,  and 
remained  uncovered.  They  could  not  in  conscience,  they 
thought,  pay  the  same  mark  of  respect  to  man  that  they  did  to 
God.  For  the  wearing  of  the  hat  had  an  especial  significance 
in  those  days.  The  historian  Bancroft,  whose  associations 
certainly  were  not  such  as  to  prepossess  him  in  favor  of  any  of 
the  peculiar  practices  of  the  early  Friends,  thus  writes  on  this 
subject  :  "  The  Quaker  bows  to  God  and  not  to  his  fellow- 
man.  The  feudal  nobility  [in  the  i  yth  Century]  still  nourished 
its  pride.  The  Quakers  knew  that  the  hat  was  the  symbol 
of  enfranchisement  [full  citizenship],  and  was  worn  by  the 
Norman  nobility  in  the  presence  of  the  King  as  a  proclama- 
tion that  they  were  peers  of  the  realm,  equal  with  their  sover- 
eign. When  Cromwell  assumed  the  power  of  a  prince  he 
covered  his  head,  all  the  others  remaining  uncovered." 

"After  more  than  a  century  and  a  quarter,  when  in  the  first 
great  scene  of  the  French  revolution,  at  the  opening  of  the 
States  General,  the  clergy  and  the  nobility,  according  to  estab- 
lished privilege,  had,  like  the  King,  put  on  their  square  caps 
and  plumed  bonnets,  the  representatives  of  the  commons, 
imitating  the  Quaker  precedent,  covered  their  heads  also  with 
their  hats,  that  had  neither  plumes  nor  ribands;  thus  explain- 
ing to  the  Bourbons  the  meaning  of  the  Quaker  symbol." 

And  now  there  came  to  George  Fox  and  his  associates  that 
fierce  .storm  of  persecution  which,  even  though  we  read  the 


i;i 

literal  account,  we  fail,  I  think,  to  comprehend  the  full  extent 
of  it.  By  it,  in  the  language  of  the  historian  I  have  quoted, 
•'  everywhere  and  for  long  wearisome  years,  they  were  exposed 
to  perpetual  dangers  and  griefs.  They  were  whipped,  crowded 
into  jails  among  felons,  kept  in  dungeons  foul  and  gloomy, 
fined,  exiled,  sold  into  colonial  bondage.  Imprisoned  in  . 
winter,  without  fire,  they  perished  from  the  cold.  Some  were 
victims  to  the  barbarous  cruelty  of  the  jailers  ;  twice  George 
Fox  narrowly  escaped  death.  They  braved  every  danger  to 
continue  their  assemblies.  Haled  out  by  violence  they  re- 
turned ;  when  their  meeting-houses  were  torn  down  they 
gathered  openly  on  the  ruins.  They  could  not  be  dissolved 
by  armed  men,  and  when  their  opposers  took  shovels  to  throw 
rubbish  on  them  they  stood  close  together,  willing  to  be  buried 
alive  witnessing  for  the  Lord." 

One  whose  eloquent  voice  is  now  stilled  in  death,  the  late 
Henry  Armitt  Brown,  quoted,  in  his  Burlington  address,  that 
wonderful  event  in  their  early  history  when,  in  one  of  the 
darkest  hours,  their  comrades  lay  languishing  in  prison,  the 
Friends  marched  in  procession  to  Westminster  Hall,  to  offer 
themselves  to  Parliament  as  hostages  for  their  brethren.  '"  In 
love  to  our  brethren,  say  they,  who  lie  in  Prisons,  in  dungeons 
and  in  many  fetters  and  irons,  and  have  been  cruelly  beat  by 
the  cruel  jailers  *  "^  and  many  who  be  sick  and  weak  in 
Prison  and  on  straw  *  "^  we  do  offer  up  our  bodies  and 
selves  to  you  for  you  to  put  us  as  lambs  into  the  same  dungeons, 
and  do  stand  ready  a  sacrifice  for  to  go  into  their  places  that 
they  may  go  forth  and  not  die." 

And  yet  this  is  by  no  means  an  isolated  instance  of  its  kind 
in  their  history.  When  George  Fox  lay  in  his  cheerless  prison, 
one  of  the  Friends  went  to  Oliver  Cromwell  and  offered  to  lie 
there  in  his  stead.  Then  it  was  that  Cromwell,  struck  by  this 
act  of  friendship,  looked  around  on  his  followers  and  said, 
"  which  of  you  would  do  as  much  for  me  if  I  were  in  the  same 
condition  ?"  In  Wales,  Richard  Davies  offered  himself  in  the 
place  of  his  younger  friend  Thomas  Ellis.  So  deeply  affected 
were  some  of  the  magistrates  by  this  unselfish  act,  that  they 
became  Friends  themselves,  and  persecution  ceased  in  that 
immediate  neighborhood. 


1 1 


But  perhaps  the  mo-^L  uniching  instance  of  self-sacrifice  of 
this  kind  was  seen  in  the  case  of  James  Parnell,  ''a  little  lad," 
as  George  Fox  calls  him,^  who  was  imprisoned  when  l)ut 
eighteen  years  old  in  Colchester  Castle.  An  ingenuity  of 
torture,  worthy  of  the  Spanish  Inquisition,  was  devised  by  his 
jailers,  which  resulted  in  a  serious  fall,  by  which  he  received 
several  severe  bodily  injuries.  Unable  to  reach  his  room,  he 
was  now  put  into  a  cell  so  small  that  it  was  called  the  oven, 
with  no  access  for  light  or  air  but  by  the  open  door.  Ten- 
derly commiserating  the  sufferings  of  this  youthful  martyr, 
three  of  his  friends  went  to  his  jailer  and  begged  that  the  poor 
lad  might  go  to  their  home  until  he  had  recovered  from  his 
injuries,  offering  to  lie  in  this  wretched  hole,  body  for  body, 
in  his  place,  and  voluntarily  engaging  to  be  bound  under 
penalty  of  a  considerable  sum  of  money  if  they  failed  to  take 
his  place. 

The  rapid  spread  of  the  principles  of  the  religious  Society 
of  Friends  was  not  confined  to  England.  In  the  year  1653 
one  Morgan  Floyd,  "a  priest  of  Wrexham,"  North  Wales, 
sent  two  of  his  congregation  to  the  north  of  England  to  in- 
quire concerning  Friends  and,  as  George  Fox  says,  '^  to  trie 
us  and  bring  home  an  account  of  us."  Both  of  these  Welsh- 
men "were  convinced  of  the  Truth,"  and  coming  to  scoff 
remained  to  pray.  They  stayed  some  time  with  Friends, 
and  then  went  home,  where  one  of  them  returned,  after  a  time, 
to  his  old  f^iith,  but  the  other  remained  steadfast  to  his  con- 
victions, and  became  a  valiant  preacher  among  Friends.  There 
was  much  in  the  simplicity  of  Quakerism  to  commend  it  to 
the  Welsh,  who  are  a  brave,  thoughtful  and  independent  peo- 
ple, and  John  ap  John  soon  found  himself  in  the  midst  of  an 
intelligent,  earnest  company  of  fellow  believers.  They  were, 
as  a  rule,  men  of  good  education,  and  many  of  them  of  dis- 
tinguished ancestry.  Prominent  among  them  were  Charles 
and  Thomas  Lloyd,  of  Dolobran,  John  ap  Thomas,  of  Llaith- 
gwm,  Hugh  Roberts,  James  Lewis,  Richard  Davies  and  others. 

•  George  Fox  says  :  "  Whoi  I  was  in  the  dungeon  at  Carlisle  one  James 
Parnell,  a  little  lad  of  about  sixteen  years  of  age,  came  to  see  me  and  was 
convinced,  and  the  Lord  quickly  made  him  a  powerful  minister  of  the 
Word  of  life,  and  many  were  turned  to  Christ  by  him.'* 


15 


They  bore  the  persecution  to  which  they  were  subjected  with 
a  courage  as  great  as  that  with  which  their  fathers  encounter- 
ed the  perils  of  the  battle-field.  1  have  elsewhere^  spoken  fully 
respecting  them,  and  merely  pause  for  a  moment  to  notice 
them  here,  because  of  the  large  part  they  took  in  the  settle- 
ment of  the  Province  of  Pennsylvania. 

The  north  of  England,  which  was  the  home  of  Fox  and  of 
so  many  of  his  companions,  was  too  near  the  border  of  Scot- 
land long  to  leave  the  Scottish  people  in  ignorance  of  the  new 
and  strange  faith  which  was  so  rapidly  .spreading  itself  among 
the  people.      Prominent  among  the  early  converts  were  Alex- 
ander Jaffrey,  who  had  been  Chief  Magistrate  of  Aberdeen. 
Patrick  Livingstone,  through  whose  instrumentality  large  num- 
bers were  added  to  the  church  in  Scotland,  John,  nineteenth 
Baron  of  Swintoun,  an  ancestor  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  David 
Barclay  of  Ury,  and   his  son  Robert.     William  Penn,  in  his 
"  Rise  and  Progress  of  the  Society  of  Friends,"  says  that  the 
primitive  Friends  were  not  great  and  learned  in  the  esteem  of 
this  world,   "for  then  they  had  not  wanted  followers  upon 
their  own  credit  and  authority."     Yet  among  them,  as  among 
the  early  Christians,  there  were  not  wanting  men  learned  in 
the  schools,  who  showed  then,  as  St.  Luke  and  St.  Paul  had 
done  before,  that  intellectual  culture,  under  Divine  guidance, 
may  become  a  potent  factor  for  good.      Where,  indeed,  in  the 
early  history  of  any  church,  can  there  be  found  three  men  the 
equals  in  native  talent,  in  profoimd  scholarship,  in  graceful 
authorship,  of   Charles    Lloyd   of   Wales,    William    Penn   of 
England,  and  Robert  Barclay  of  Scotland? 

We  all  know  how  bitterly  opposed  to  his  son's  new  faith 
was  Sir  William  Penn.  It  was  not  thus  with  the  father  of 
Robert  Barclay.  A  brave  old  soldier  under  Gustavus  Adolphus. 
a  dashing  cavalry  officer  of  the  civil  war,  allied  by  marriage 
with  the  royal  house  of  Stuart,  David  Barclay,  while  a  priso- 
ner of  State  in  Edinburgh  Castle,  became  a  Friend.  His  son 
had  been  sent  to  France,  where  under  the  care  oi  his  uncle, 
the  rector  of  the  Scottish  College  there,  he  had  made  great 
progress  in  his  studies,  and  had  begun  to  look  with  some  favor 
on  the  Church  of  Rome. 

'  Pennsylvania  Magazine  of  History  and  Biography,  vol.  4,  i>.  ^01,  c/si'</. 


16 

At  his  mother's  request,  Robert  Banlay  was  recalled  to 
Scotland,  where  he  soon  after  became  a  Friend,  and,  a  little 
later,  issued  that  remarkable  doctrinal  thesis,  so  well  known  to 
you  as  Barclay's  Apology.  This  essay  was  first  written  in  the 
Latin  language,  an  illustration  of  the  wonderful  erudition  of  its 
young  author— he  was  then  but  twenty-eight  years  old.  It  has 
passed  through  more  than  twenty  editions,  and  as  is  acknowl- 
edged even  by  those  who  do  not  agree  with  it.  it  has  never 
had  its  propositions  successfully  refuted. 

In  the  English  Channel,  about  fifteen  miles  from  France,  is 
a  little  island  known  as  Jersey,  containing  in  all  an  area  of 
about  forty-five  square  miles.  During  the  civil  wars  of  England, 
King  Charles  found  safety  in  its  fortress,  and  Sir  George 
Carteret  successfully  defended  it  from  the  enemy.  Many 
years  later,  when  Sir  George  became  possessed  of  the  tract  of 
land  whi(  h  lies  directly  east  of  us,  in  honor  of  his  brave 
defence  of  the  little  island  in  the  Channel,  this  territory  was 
named  New  Jersey,  the  name  it  still  retains.  The  eastern 
part  was  settled  early,  and  among  these  early  -onler^  were 
several  gentlemen  of  Scottish  nativity. 

In  the  year  1682  Robert  Barclay  was  appointed  Governor 
of  East  Jersey.  Says  a  writer  :  ''  Barclay  united  every  quali- 
fication for  the  office,  being  equally  capable  of  excelling  in 
worldly  matters  as  in  those  of  a  spiritual  nature,  and  possess- 
ing great  influence,  not  only  among  the  Quakers,  but  also 
with  the  King  and  Duke  of  York.  As  if  his  name  were 
a  tower  of  strength,  he  was  not  required  to  visit  East  Jersey 
in  person,  being  permitted  to  exercise  his  authority  by  deputy. 
This  appointment  was  for  life,  but  his  successors  were  to  serve 
but  for  three  years."  Governor  Barclay  held  this  appoint- 
ment until  his  death,  which  occurred  8th  mo.  3d,  1690,  wlien 
he  was  but  forty-two  years  old. 

Such  a  life — so  brief  in  its  duration,  and  yet  so  full  of  great 
results,  irresistibly  recalls  the  words  of  the  wise  King  Solomon, 
'^  Honorable  age  is  not  that  which  standeth  in  length  of  time, 
nor  that  is  measured  by  number  of  years.  But  wisdom  is  the 
grey  hair  unto  men,  and  an  unspotted  life  is  old  age.  He 
being  made  perfect  in  a  short  time,  fulfilled  a  long  time.'' 

Notwithstanding  his  high  social  position,  the  bravery  with 


17 

which  he  had  fought  as  a  soldier,  his  learning,  piety  and  worth, 
David  Barclay  was  often  the  subject  of  persecution,  imprison- 
ment and  insult.  One  such  occurrence  has  been  made  bv  our 
poet,  Whittier,  the  theme  of  what  I  have  always  regarded  as 
one  of  his  ablest  poems,  and  one  of  the  most  remarkable  pen- 
pictures  I  have  ever  met  with.  Perhaps  you  will  bear  with 
me  while  I  read  some  verses  of  the  poem,  doubtless  familiar 
to  many  of  you. 

"  Up  the  street  of  Aberdeen, 
By  the  kirk  and  college-green, 

Rode  the  Laird  of  Ury ; 
Close  l)ehind  him — close  beside, 
Foul  of  mouth  and  evil-eyed, 

Pressed  the  mob  in  fury. 

"  Flouted  him  the  drunken  churl, 
Jeered  at  him  the  serving-girl, 

Prompt  to  please  her  master ; 
And  the  begging  carlin,  late 
Fed  and  clothed  at  Ury's  gate, 

Cursed  him  as  he  passed  her. 

"  Vet,  with  calm  and  stately  mien, 
Up  the  street  of  Aberdeen 
Came  he,  slowly  riding; 
And,  to  all  he  saw  and  heard, 
Answering  not  with  bitter  word, 
Turning  not  for  chiding. 

"  Came  a  troop,  with  broadswords  swinging;, 
Bits  and  bridles  sharply  ringing, 
Loose  and  free  and  froward  ; 
Quoth  the  foremost,  '  Ride  him  down  ! 
Push  him  \  prick  him  !  through  the  town 
Drive  the  Quaker  coward  I' 


3 


"  But,  from  out  the  thickening  crowd, 
Cried  a  sudden  voice  and  loud  : 

'  Barclay  I  ho  I  a  Barclay  I' 
And  the  oM  man  at  his  side, 
Saw  a  comrade,  battle  tried, 

Scarred  and  sunburned  darkly; 


1^ 

•'Who,  with  ready  weapon  bare, 

Fronting  to  the  troopers  there, 

Cried  aloud,  '  God  save  us  I 

Call  ye  coward  him  who  stood 

Ankle-deep  in  Lutzens  blood, 

With  the  brave  Gustavus  ?" 

*' '  Nay,  I  do  not  need  thy  ^word. 
Comrade  mine,'  said  Ury'-  lord  : 

'  Put  it  up,  I  pray  thee  , 
Passive  to  His  holy  will, 
Trust  I  in  my  Master  still. 

Even  though  Tie  slny  nif.  ' 

"'  Pledizes  of  thv  love  ano  uiuii. 
Proved  on  many  a  tield  of  death, 

Not  by  me  are  needed." 
Marvelled  much  that  henchman  ih-hI. 
That  his  laird,  so  stout  oi  old. 

Now  so  meekly  pleaded. 

•'  •  Woe's  the  day,"  he  sadly  >aid, 
With  a  slowly  shaking  head. 
And  a  look  of  pity, 

*  Ury's  honest  laird  reviled. 
Mock  of  knave,  and  sport  ot  luh'I. 

In  his  own  good  city  I' 

■*  '  Speak  the  word — and,  masicr  nunc 
As  we  charged  on  Tilly's  line, 

And  his  W^alloon  lancers, 
Smiting  through  their  midst,  wc  11  teach 
Civil  look  and  decent  speech. 

To  these  boyish  prancers  ! ' 

"  '  Marvel  not,  my  ancient  friend. 

Like  beginning,  like  the  end,' 

Quoth  the  Laird  of  Ury  ; 

*  Is  the  sinful  servant  more 

Than  his  gracious  Lord  who  bore 
Bonds  and  stripes  in  Jewry  ? 

•'  *  Give  me  joy,  that  in  His  name. 
I  can  bear  with  patient  frame. 
All  these  vain  ones  ofifer ; 


19 

While  for  them  He  suffereth  long. 
Shall  I  answer  wrong  with  wrong. 
Scoffing  with  the  scofifer  ? 


"  '  Hard  to  feel  the  stranger's  scoff; 
Hard  the  old  friends  falling  off; 

Hard  to  learn  forgiving; 
But  the  Lord  his  own  rewards. 
And  his  love  with  theirs  accords. 
Warm  and  fresh  and  living. 

•*  '  Through  this  dark  and  stormy  night, 
Faith  beholds  a  feeble  light 

Up  the  blackness  streaking  ; 
Knowing  God's  own  time  is  best. 
In  a  patient  hope  I  rest, 
For  the  full  day  breaking.' 

•'  So  the  Laird  of  L^ry  said, 
Turning  slow  his  horse's  head 

Tow  ards  the  Tolbooth  prison  ; 
Where,  through  iron  grates  he  heard. 
Poor  disciples  of  the  W^ord, 
Preach  of  Christ  arisen," 

As  Philadelpliians  we  are  so  accustomed  to  regard  our  Coiii- 
monwealth  as  tlie  especial  home  of  Quakerism  in  the  ne\A 
world,  that  we  are  prone  to  forget  that  long  before  William 
Penn  landed  on  these  shores,  various  members  of  the  Religious 
Society  of  Friends  had  emigrated  to  America,  that  meetings 
for  worship,  and  even  Yearly  Meetings  of  considerable  num- 
bers were  held  in  New  England,  in  Maryland  and  elsewhere. 
So  early  as  1655,  two  women  Friends,  Mary  Fisher  and  Anne 
Austin,  visited  Barbadoes,  and,  in  the  following  year,  were  in 
New  England,  where  they  were  soon  followed  by  eight  other 
ministering  Friends.  There  were  many  Friends  settled  in  the 
vicinity  of  New  Amsterdam,  on  Long  Island,  and  in  East 
Jersey,  and  in  the  year  1677,  the  ship  Kent  landed  a  goodly 
company  of  Friends  at  Chygoes  island,  where  they  founded 
what  is  now  the  ancient  and  honorable  city  of  Burlington.  I 
mention  tliese  facts  that  we  Philadelphians  may  not  be  pre- 
sumptuous, and  because  it  explains  the  concern  which  impelled 
George  Fox,  in  the  year  1671,  to  go  beyond  the  seas  and  vis^t 


•20 


the  plantations  in  America.  I  rannot  but  regard  this  visit, 
occurring  when  it  did,  as  one  of  the  most  remarkable 
instances  of  missionary  labor  of  which  there  is  any  record. 

It  was  during  a  little  lull  in  the  fierceness  of  that  perse(  ution 
from  which  he  and  his  friends  had  so  greatly  suffered,  thnt 
George  Fox  wrote  to  his  wife,  who  but  a  short  time  before 
had  been  released  from  prison,  that,  in  the  words  I  have 
already  quoted,  it  was  laid  upon  him  of  the  Lord  to  go  beyond 
the  seas  and  visit  the  plantations  in  America,  and  asking  her 
to  meet  him  in  London. 

Surely  if  ever  there  was  a  time  in  George  Fox's  life  when 
the  temptation  to  rest  and  ease  presented  itself,  it  was  at  this 
time.  His  wife  was  just  restored  to  her  liberty  and  to  her 
estates  ;  his  own  health  was  greatly  shattered  and  sadly  need- 
ing (are  and  good  nursing;  persecution  was  abated,  and 
everything  conspired  to  induce  him  to  remain  in  his  comfort- 
able liome  at  Swarthmore.  But  George  Fox  was  not  such  a 
man.  It  was  enough  for  him  to  know  that  it  was  laid  on  him 
of  the  Lord  to  go,  and  all  the  dangers  of  the  way,  and  all  the 
comforts  of  his  home  were  alike  disregarded. 

On  the  1 2th  day  of  Sixth  month,  1671,  in  the  yacht 
Industry,  Captain  Thomas  Forster,  in  company  with  several 
Friends,  and  having  in  all  about  fifty  passengers,  he  sailed  for 
Barbadoes,  a  British  island  of  the  West  Indies,  with  which 
there  then  was  a  considerable  commerce  with  England,  and 
later,  a  brisk  trade  carried  on  by  the  American  colonies. 

In  his  ode  to  his  friend  Virgil,  the  poet,  Horace  says  that 
he  was  a  brave  man  who  first  dared  to  commit  his  fragile  bark 
to  the  sea  ;  but  surely  he  was  a  braver  man  who  dared  trust 
himself,  at  that  time,  on  the  Atlantic,  whic  h  then  had  added 
to  the  ordinary  risks  of  ocean  travel,  the  dangers  of  a  sea 
infested  with  pirates  from  the  Barbary  coast. 

Just  such  a  danger  the  yacht  Industry  encountered  ;  for 
when  they  had  been  at  sea  three  weeks,  they  espied  what 
proved  to  be  a  man-of-war  from  the  Barbary  coast  bearing 
down  upon  them  and  soon  giving  them  chase.  The  passen- 
gers generally  were  much  frightened;  but,  writes  Fox. 
''Friends  were  well  satisfied,  having  faith  in  God,  and  no 
fear   upon    their  spirits."      The    pirate   continued   the   chase 


21 


until  sun-down,  making  rapidly  towards  them.  At  sunset  the 
Industry  altered  her  course,  hoping  to  mislead,  but  the  pirate 
soon  altered  his  also  and  gained  still  more  on  her.  Then  the 
captain,  remembering  the  voyage  of  another  man  of  God,  and 
profiting  by  the  lesson,  went  to  George  Fox's  cabin  and  asked 
what  he  should  do,  for,  said  he,  "  if  the  mariners  had  taken 
Paul's  counsel  they  had  not  come  to  the  danger  they  did." 
''  I  told  him,"  writes  Fox,  "  that  it  was  a  trial  of  faith,  and. 
therefore,  the  Lord  was  to  be  waited  on  for  coun.sel.  So, 
retiring  in  spirit,  the  Lord  showed  me  that  his  life  and  power 
was  placed  between  us  and  the  ship  that  pursued  us.  I  told 
this  to  the  master  and  the  rest,  and  that  the  best  way  was  to 
tack  about  and  steer  on  our  right  course.  I  wished  them  also 
to  put  out  all  their  candles  but  tho.se  that  they  steered  by,  and 
to  speak  to  all  the  passengers  to  be  still  and  quiet.  About  the 
eleventh  hour  of  the  night,  the  watch  called  and  said  they 
were  just  upon  us.  This  disquieted  .some  of  the  passengers, 
whereupon  I  sat  up  in  my  cabbin,  and  looking  through  the  port 
hole,  the  moon  being  not  quite  down,  I  saw  them  very  near 
us.  I  was  getting  up  to  go  out  of  the  cabbin,  but  remember- 
ing the  word  of  the  Lord,  that  his  life  and  power  was  placed 
between  them  and  us,  I  lay  down  again  *  *  By  this  time 
the  moon  was  quite  gone  down,  and  then  a  fresh  gale  arose, 
and  the  Lord  hid  us  from  them,  and  we  sailed  briskly  on  and 
saw  them  no  more." 

On  the  3d  of  8th  month  they  arrived  at  Barbadoes,  after  a 
voyage  of  nearly  two  months.  George  Fox  was  a  very  feeble 
and  ill  man  when  he  landed,  his  illness  lasting  for  about  three 
weeks.  But  feeble  as  he  was,  he  was  not  idle,  but  gave,  from 
his  sick  chamber,  much  advice  respecting  the  discipline  of  the 
Church.  One  of  the  subjects  under  his  care  while  in  Barba- 
does, is  especially  noteworthy,  as  showing  that  the  founder  of 
our  Religious  Society  early  saw  the  evils  of  negro  slavery,  and 
was  among  the  first  to  suggest  a  remedy,  which,  one  hundred 
and  fifty  years  later  was  adopted  by  the  British  Government. 
He  writes  :  *^  As  to  their  blacks,  or  negroes,  I  desired  them  to 
train  them  up  in  the  fear  of  God,  as  well  them  that  were 
bought  with  their  money  as  them  that  were  born  in  their 
families,  that  all  might  come  to  a  knowledge  of  the  Lord.     I 


')') 


desired  also  that  they  would  cause  their  overseers  to  deal 
mildly  and  gently  witli  their  negroes,  and  not  use  anv  crueltN 
towards  them,  as  the  manner  of  some  hath  been,  and  that', 
after  certain  years  of  servitude,  they  would  set  them  free." 

This  it  will  be  noticed,  was  in 'the  vear  1671,  seventeen 
years  before  Pastorius  and  the  Germantown  Friends  had  issued 
their  famous  testimony  against  slavery. 

Barbadoes  proved  to  be  a  very  hospitable  shore  for  Georoc 

Fox  and  his  friends,  the  Governor  of  the  island  receiving  them 

very  kmdly  at  his  own  home.     All  classes  of  people  came  in 

their  meetings,  which  were  so  large  that  at  last  some  of  their 

adversaries  endeavored  to  defame  Friends  with  manv  false  and 

scandalous  reports ;   -whereupon,"  says  Fox,    -  I  with  some 

other  Friends,  drew  up  a  paper  to  go  forth  in  the  name  of  the 

people  called  Quakers,  for  the  clearing  Truth   and  Friends 

from  those  false  reports." 

This  remarkable  paper,  which  constitutes  one  of  the  fullest 
and   clearest   expositions  of  the   doctrines  of  the   Religious 
Society  of  Friends,  has,  on  another  occasion,  l)een  quoted  by 
me.^     It  gives  the  strongest  denial  to  many  slanders  which 
had  then,  and  have  since,  been  circulated  respecting  the  faith 
of  the  Friends,  especially,  in   Fox's  own  words,    "with  refer- 
ence to  the  charge  that  they  do  denv  God  and  Christ  Jesus 
and  the  Scriptures  of  Truth."     It  is  couched  in  such  clear 
unequivocal    language,   that   there   can   be   no   mistakinir   its 
meaning,  and  I  strongly  commend  it  to  the  careful  perusal  of 
such  of  my  audience  as  may  not  be  familiar  with  it. 

After  three    months    in    Barbadoes,    and    seven    weeks    in 
Jamaica,  George  Fox  and  his  companions  set  sail  for  Maryland 
which  they  reached  after  a  difficult  and  pretty  dangerous  pas- 
sage of  between  six  and  seven  weeks. 

George  Fox  gives  an  interesting  account  of  his  travels  on 
the  eastern  shore  of  Maryland.  To  one  of  his  meetings  he 
says:  '•'  It  was  upon  me  from  the  Lord  to  send  to  the  Indian 
emperour  and  his  kings  to  come  to  the  meeting.  The 
emperour  came,  but  his  kings,  lying  further  off,  could  not 
reach  thither  time  enough.  They  came  later,  and  we  had  in 
the  evening  two  good  opportunities  with  them,  and  they 
1  See  Philadelphia  Frietid,  Vol.  54,  p.  218. 


\ 


V\ 


23 

heard  the  word  of  the  Lord  willingly,  and  did  confess  to  it, 
and  carried  themselves  very  courteously  and  lovingly."     This, 
I   suspect,   was   one   of  the   very  earliest   conferences  of  the 
Indians  and  the  Quakers.     And  now  began  the  journey  by 
land  of  George  Fox  and  his  companions  to  New  England  ; 
as  he  says  :   "A  tedious  journey  through  the  woods  and  wil- 
derness; over  bogs  and  great  rivers."     I   cannot   do   more 
than   hurriedly   notice   these   journeyings, — how   rivers   were 
forded  ;  how  the  weaker  ones  of  his  little  party  were  fain  to 
fall  short  and  lie  in  the  woods  all  night  long ;   how  by  hard 
riding.  Fox  and  one  or  two  others  got  to   "a   Dutch   town 
called  New  Castle,"  how  departing  hence,  they  got  over  the 
river  Delaware,  ''not  without  danger  to  some  of  our  lives;" 
how  once  over,  "we  had  to  get  new  guides,  who  were  hard 
to  get,  and  very  chargeable."     "  Then,"  says  Fox,  "  we  had 
that  wilderness  country  to  pass  through,  which  is  since  called 
West  Jersey,  (this,  bear  in  mind,  was  in  the  year  1672)  which 
was  not  then  inhabited  by  English,  so  that  we  have  travelled 
a  whole  day  together  without  seeing  man  or  woman,  horse  or 
dwelling-place,  and  sometimes  we  lay  in  the  woods  by  a  fire, 
and  sometimes  in  the  Indians'  wigwams,  or  houses."      Won- 
derful is  it  to  note  how  these  simple  savages  kindly  received 
and  cared  for  this  man  of  God,  who  never  failed  to  tell  them, 
when  he  could  do  so,  that  Christ  died  for  all  men,  for  their  sins 
as  well  as  for  others,  and  that   He  had  enlightened  them  as 
well  as  others. 

Coming  to  Middletown,  an  English  plantation  in  East 
Jersey,  they  were  met  by  Richard  Hartshorn,  a  Friend,  for- 
merly of  London,  "who  received  us  gladly  to  his  house," 
'^  where  we  refreshed  ourselves,  for  we  were  weary  ;"  "  and 
then  he  carried  us  and  our  horses  in  his  own  boat  over  a  great 
river,  and  .set  us  upon  Long  Island. ' '  The  day  following  they 
were  at  Oyster  Bay,  where  they  attended  the  Half-Year's 
Meeting,  and  where  they  had  "  publick  meetings  for  worship, 
to  which  the  people  of  the  world  of  all  sorts  might  and  did 
come."  Some  time  later,  George  Fox  went  to  Rhode  Island, 
where  he  was  kindly  received  by  all  classes,  and  where  he 
attended  New  England  Yearly  Meeting.  At  Narragansett 
they  made  so  favorable  an  impression  that,  to  use  Fox's  words 


24 


again,  ''  one  of  the  magislrates  saui,  if  they  had  money  enough 
they  would  hire  me  to  be  their  minister."  •  This,"  he  adds, 
''  was  because  they  did  not  know  us  and  our  principles.  But 
when  I  heard  it,  I  said  it  was  time  for  me  to  be  gone,  for  if 
their  eye  was  so  much  to  me,  or  to  any  of  us,  they  would  not 
come  to  their  own  teacher  -^^  *  for  this  thing  had  spoiled 
many  by  hindering  them  from  improving  their  own  talents, 
whereas  our  labour  is  to  bring  every  one  to  his  own  teacher  in 
himself." 

Moving  southward,  George  Fox  and  his  company,  often- 
times in  great  peril  and  amid  many  difficulties,  passed  on, 
with  their  Indian  guides,  by  the  shore  of  the  Delaware,  until 
they  reached  New  Castle,  where  they  were  kindly  received  l)y 
the  Governor,  and  where  they  had  the  first  Friends'  Meeting 
ever  held  there. 

Thence  their  journey  lay  through  Maryland,  Virginia  and 
North  Carolina,— wading  through  deep  swamps,  sleeping  in 
the  woods,  often  ill,  and  wet  and  cold.  But  amid  all  this 
hunger  and  cold  and  wet,  his  boat  overturned,  a  part  of  his 
higgage  lost,  his  companions  at  times  ready  to  give  up,  the 
heart  of  George  Fox  never  failed  him.  In  the  darkest  hours 
of  his  journeyings,  the  Light  which  in  his  youth  had  shone  on 
his  path  in  the  vale  of  Beavor,  shone  on  his  pathway  still.  It 
is  remarkable  how,  amid  all  his  difficulties,  George  Fox  kept, 
as  he  carefully  did,  a  Journal  of  his  travels,  which  has  been 
preserved  to  the  present  day. 

On  the  2ist  of  ^d  monHi,  1673,  "  finding  our  spirits  clear 
of  these  parts,"  George  Fox  and  his  friends  set  sail  for 
England,  where  they  arrived  4th  month  28th,  1673. 

At  Bristol  George  Fox  was  met  by  his  wife  and  her  children. 
A  little  later  came  William  Penn,  and  here  and  then  George 
Fox  and  he  held  long  conferences  respecting  the  new  world, 
towards  whose  shores  Penn's  eyes  had  long  been  turned,  and 
where,  in  less  than  ten  years,  he  was  in  person  to  found  a 
Province. 

George  Fox  never  forgot  his  visit  to  America,  or  the 
friends  he  met  and  made  there.  Seventeen  years  later  he, 
who  had  three  days  before  preached' with  great  force  and  fer- 
vency, lay  on  his  bed  of  death,  in  the  simple  language  of  his 


25 


biographer,  ''in  much  contentment  and  peace,  and  vcrv 
sensible  to  the  last."  The  fear  of  death  had  long  been 
taken  from  him,  and  his  last  thoughts  were  for  the'living. 
•'  All  is  well,"  said  the  dying  man  ;  "  the  seed  of  God  reigns 
over  all,  and  over  death  itself!"  and  then,  as  though  he  feh 
that  there  yet  was  much  work  to  be  done  which  he  could  no: 
do,  he  turned  lovingly  to  those  about  him  who,  as  thev  were 
(lualified  for  it,  were  now  to  take  his  place,  and  lookin:; 
earnestly  at  them  said:  ''  Mind  poor  Friends  in  Ireland- 
mind  poor  Friends  in  America^'  and  as  if  to  emphasize  the 
message,  with  all  the  sanctity  of  a  dying  request,  he  repeated, 
''  Mind  poor  Friends  in  A^nerica  .'" 

As  we  look  back  over  the  history  of  these  early  Friends,  we 
are  tempted  to  ask  :  have  subsequent  results  compensated  for 
this  fearfiil  expenditure  of  all  that  men  deem  valuable  in  life, 
— health,    strength,    liberty— life    itself? 

/  think  they  have,  and  I  include  in  this  expenditure,  the 
frightful  persecutions  in  IvJew  England,  where  three  highly 
cultivated  Christian  men  had  their  ears  cut  off;  where  deli- 
cately nurtured  women,  younger  and  older,  were  whipped  at 
the  cart-tail  from  town  to  town,  and  where  Robinson,  Steven- 
son, Leddra  and  Mary  Dyer  perished  by  the  hand  of  the 
hangman. 

As  I  read  to-day,  on  every  side,  the  recognition  of  the  great 
doctrine  of  an  indwelling  Christ,  hear  it  preached  by  Episco- 
palian, Presbyterian,  Baptist  and  others,  see  how  it  permeates 
the  life  of  the  best  men  in  all  our  churches,  to  what  results  it 
has  already  led,  and  to  what  liigher  ones  it  is  leading  :  when  I 
see,  as  I  daily  do,  their  views  on  tithes,  on  oaths,  on  complete 
religious  toleration,  accepted  as  correct  by  Christians  all  about 
me,  I  know  that  these  early  Friends  did  not  live— did  not  die 
— in  vain. 

I.  have  elsewhere'  spoken  on  this  subject,  and  have  there 
(juoted  the  remarkable  words  of  the  Bishop  of  the  Protestant 
Episcopal  Church  of  Pennsylvania,  the  emphatic  language  of 
the  Chairman  of  the  late  Pan -Presbyterian  Council,  and  I  need 
not  repeat  these  here.  But  I  cannot  refrain  from  calling  vour 
attention  to  what  I  regard  as  one  of  the  most  remarkable 
'  See  Philadelphia  Frimd.  Vol.  54,  p.  218,  d  seq. 


2(J 


27 


modern  recognitions  of  the  doctrine  of  the  immanence  oi  the 
Holy  Spirit.     It  occurs  in  the  last  two  numbers  of  the  Princeton 
Review,  an  organ  of  the  Presbyterian  Church,  and  is  written 
by  a  clergyman  of  the  Episcopal    Divinity  School  at  Cam- 
bridge—mark, my  friends,  not  at  Harvard,  but  the  Episcopal 
School  at  Cambridge— that  Cambridge  through  whose  streets, 
two  centuries  ago,  brave  men  and  delicate  women  were  whipped 
at  the  cart-tail,- almost  under  the  shadow   of  that   -bloody 
Boston,"  on  whose  Common— holding  just  such  doctrine- 
William  Robinson  and  his  companions  gave  up  their  lives. 
The  essay  referred  to  is  entitled  -  The  Theolo^^ical Renaissance 
of  the  19th  Century:'     After  noting  the  belief  in  the  early 
Greek  Church  of  a  Being  whose  presence  pervaded  the  whole 
earth,  and  the  substitution  for  this  of  the  idea,  as  prevalent  in 
the  Latin  churches,  of  God  as  remote  from  the  world,  the 
author  then  traces  the   gradual   re-development  in  the  19th 
Century,  of  the  doctrine  of  the  indwelling  of  the  Holy  Spirit, 
and  quoting  Wordsworth's  beautiful  words,  recognizing  this 
indwelling,  he  adds  :   "  Such  is  the  conviction  which  underlies 
all  that  is  highest  and  most  truly  characteristic  of  our  own 
age      Under  its  influence  the  curse  beneath  which  the  crea- 
tion so  long  has  groaned,  has  been  lifted,  and  the  world  and 
humanity  have  become  allied  to   God   in   an    intimate  and 
necessary  relationship."^ 

1  cannot  follow  further  the  writer,  but  will  only  add  that, 

1  The  exact  words  of  the  writer  are  :   "  The  idea  of  God,  as  .een  m  the 
earlier  Greek  Church,  is  that  of  a  Being  whose  presence  pervades  the 
world   and  with  whose  essential  nature  man  has  a  constitutional  kin.hip, 
or  relation.     The  idea  of  God  as  remote  from  the  world,  reigned  supreme 
in  Catholic  and  Protestant  theologies.     The  Lutheran  reformers  distinctly 
took  the  position,  and  in  so  doing  were  followed  by  the  great  English  theo- 
logians of  the  Puritan  school,  that  (iod  spoke  to  men  only  through  the  text 
and  letter  of  Scripture.     The  Bible  became  a  substitute  for  a  living  C  hnst. 
If  God  be  assumed  in  thought  as  at  a  distance  from  the  world,  and,  fron. 
his  remote  abode,  never  moves  to   draw   any  nearer  to  his   creation;   if 
Christ  came  for  a  moment  in  time  [only],  and  departed   [forever]   to  sit 
down  on  his  judgment  throne,  it  is  not  unreasonable  to  believe  that  some 
vicar  has  been  appointed  to  represent  absent  Deity,  and  to  govern  not 
only  the  Church,  but  the  wodd  also  in  his  stead.     A  system  of  mediators 
is  sure  to  arise  as  a  substitute  for  that  living  Divine  presence  which  the 
mind  has  lost." 


I 


nearly  every  view  presented  by  this  evidently  learned,  sincere 
and  thoughtful  churchman,  as  the  correct  theology  of  the  19th 
Century,  had  been  anticipated  by  George  Fox  in  the  17th. 

And  here,  too,  I  cannot  refrain  from  noting  in  what  a 
remarkable  manner  the  crime  of  the  New  England  rulers 
towards  the  early  Friends  is  expiated,  so  far  as  it  can  be,  by 
the  most  distinguished  poet  and  by  the  most  eminent  historian 
of  New  England,  of  this  generation. 

With  Whittier's  poems  of  ''Cassandra  Southwick,"  and 
"The  King's  Missive,"  you  are  doubtless  familiar;  but  the 
poem  of  ''John  Endicott;'  by  Longfellow,  is,  to  my  mind, 
when  I  remember  that  its  author  was  not  a  Friend,  even  more 
remarkable  in  this  way  than  anything  the  Quaker  poet  has 
written.  Considering  the  license  usually  granted  to  poets,  its 
historical  accuracy  is  remarkable.  It  is  in  blank  verse,  but 
some  parts  of  it  are  very  poetical,  as  well  as  truthful.  The 
scene  is  laid  in  Boston,  in  1665,  when  persecution  of  the 
Friends  was  at  its  height.  John  Norton,  the  Puritan  minister, 
is  urging  Governor  Endicott  to  greater  severity,  when  the 
latter  says  of  the  Friends : 

"  Four  already  have  been  slain, 
And  others  banished  upon  pain  of  death; 
But  they  come  back  again  to  meet  their  doom, 
Bringing  the  linen  for  their  winding-sheets." 

Later  in  the  poem,  Edward  Wharton,  a  Friend,  is  made  by 
the  poet  to  say— what  was  literally  true  of  the  brave  martyrs, 
Robinson  and  Stevenson  : 

"  William  and  Marmaduke,  our  martyr'd  brothers, 
Sleep  in  untimely  graves,  if  aught  untimely 
Can  find  place  in  the  providence  of  God, 
Where  nothing  comes  too  early  or  too  late. 
I  saw  their  noble  death.     They  to  the  scaffold 
Walked  hand  in  hand.     Two  hundred  armed  men, 
And  many  horsemen  guarded  them,  for  fear 
Of  rescue  by  the  crowd,  whose  hearts  were  stirred. 

"  When  they  tried  to  speak. 
Their  voices  by  the  roll  of  drums  were  drowned ; 
When  they  were  dead,  they  still  looked  fresh  and  fair, 
The  terror  of  death  was  not  upon  their  faces. 
And  Mary  Dyer  passed  through  martyrdom  to  her  reward. 


f^w^^^^^J 


28 


29 


Exclaiming,  as  they  led  her  to  her  deaili. 
•  These  many  days  I've  been  in  Paradise  !* 
And  Leddra,  too,  is  dead.      But  from  his  prison. 
The  day  before  his  death,  he  sent  these  words 
Unto  the  little  flock  of  Christ." 

1  cannot  follow  the  poet  through  all  his  sad,  but  wonder- 
fully true  narrative  ;  how  Edith  Christison  is  condemned  to  be 
whipped  from  town  to  town,  and  Edmund  Wharton  banished 
from  the  Commonwealth.  Then  comes  the  king's  missive, 
forbidding  all  further  persecution  ;  and  then,  perhaps,  strangest 
of  all,  Longfellow  puts  in  the  mouth  of  one  of  his  characters 
CFCorge  Fox's  very  words,  written  two  hundred  years  before 
in  his  Tournal.^ 

"  When  news  of  Leddra's  death 
Reached  England,  Edward  Burrough,  having  boldly 
Got  access  to  the  presence  of  the  king, 
Told  him  there  M'as  a  vein  of  innocent  blood 
Opened  in  his  dominions  here,  which  threatened 
To  overrun  them  all.     The  kmg  replied. 
'  But  I  will  stop  that  vein.'      And  he  forthwith 
Sent  his  mandamus  to  our  magistrates, 
That  they  proceed  no  further  in  this  business. 
So  all  are  pardoned,  and  all  set  at  large." 

I  shall  close  my  quotations  from  Longfellow  with  one  more 
paragraph,  first  reading  to  you  what  the  historian  Bowden 
says  of  the  fate  of  those  most  active  in  the  persecution  of 
the  Friends  in  New  England.  "  Bellingham  died  distracted. 
Adderton  was  thrown  from  his  horse  and  killed.  Norton 
died  instantly,  exclaiming,  'The  hand  of  God  is  on  me!' 
Dan  forth  was  struck  dead  by  lightning.  Webb,  who  led 
Mary  Dyer  to  execution,  was  drowned.  Johnson,  who  led 
William  Leddra  to  execution,  became  insane.  Dalton  was 
killed  by  the  falling  of  a  tree.     Brown,  of  Ipswich,  died  in 

'  (Jeorge  Fox  in  his  Journal,  p.  241,  says  :  "  As  soon  as  we  heard  of  it, 
Edward  Burrough  went  to  the  king  and  told  him  there  was  a  vein  of  inno- 
cent blood  opened  in  his  dominions  which,  if  it  were  not  stopped,  would 
overrun  all.  To  which  the  king  replied  :  "  But  I  will  stop  that  vein.'" 
Edward  Burrough  saitl,  "  Then  do  it  speedily,  as  we  know  not  how  many 
may  soon  be  put  to  death."  *  *  So  the  secretary  was  called,  and  a 
mandamus  was  forthwith  granted. 


great  horror  of  mind,  and  Norris,  of  Salem,  was  struck  dumb 
while  declaiming  against  the  Quakers."  In  the  poem,  Endi- 
(  ott  says  to  Bellingham,  the  Deputy  Governor  :  — 

*'  Ah,  Richard  Bellingham,  I  greatly  fear 
That  in  my  righteous  zeal   I  have  been  led 
To  doing  many  things,  which  left  undone. 
My  mind  would  now  be  easier.     Did  I  dream  it. 
Or  has  some  person  told  me  that  John  Norton 
Is  dead  ? 

B.      You  have  not  dreamed  it ;  he  is  dead. 
£.     Then  it  was  very  sudden,  for  I  saw  him 
Standing  where  you  now  stand,  not  long  ago. 
B.     By  his  own  fireside,  in  the  afternoon, 
A  faintness  and  a  giddiness  came  over  him, 
And,  leaning  on  the  chimney-piece,  he  cried, 
*  The  hand  of  Ciod  ib  on  me  1'  and  fell  dead. 
£.     And  did  not  some  one  say — or  have  I  dreamed  it, — 
That  Humphrey  Atherton  is  dead  I 
B.      Alas,  he  too,  is  gone,  and  by  a  death  as  sudden. 
Returning  home  one  evening,  at  the  place 
Where  usually  the  Quakers  have  been  scourged. 
His  horse  took  fright  and  threw  him  to  the  ground, 
.So  that  his  brains  were  dashed  about  the  street. 
£.     I  am  not  superstitious,  Bellingham. 

And  yet  I  tremble,  lest  it  may  have  been  a  judgment  on  him. 
B.     So  the  people  think. 

They  say  his  horse  saw,  standing  in  the  way, 
The  ghost  of  William  Leddra,  and  was  frightened. 
And,  furthermore,  brave  Richard  Davenport, 
The  captain  of  the  Castle,  in  the  storm. 
Has  been  struck  dead  by  lightning  I 
£.     Speak  no  more  I 
For,  as  I  listen  to  your  voice,  it  seems 
As  if  the  seven  thunders  uttered  their  voices. 
And  the  dead  bodies  lay  about  the  streets 
Of  the  disconsolate  city.      Bellingham  I 
I  did  not  put  tho-e  wretched  men  to  death, 
I  did  but  guard  the  passage  with  the  sword 
Pointed  towards  them,  and  they  rushed  upon  it; 
Vet  now  I  would  that  I  had  taken  no  part 
In  all  that  bloody  work." 

Pardon  this  long  quotation,  but  is  it  not  remarkable,  that 
more  than  two  hundred  years  after  these  events  transpired,  a 


30 

son  of  New  England,  not  a  Quaker,  should  in  every  New 
England  home  where  his  poems  are  to  be  found — and  what 
New  England  home  is  without  them — tell  the  story  of  the  life 
and  death  of  these  martyred  Friends? 

Whittier's  poem  of  ''  The  King's  Missive,"  is  also  remarka- 
bly historically  correct,  even  to  the  mention  of  a  little  girl 
eleven  years  old,  who  thought  it  her  duty  to  plead  for  these 
poor  prisoners  for  conscience'  sake,  and  who  went  all  the  way 
from  what  was  then  called  New  Netherlands,  but  is  now  New 
York,  to  do  so.  It  will  be  remembered  that  the  events  this 
poem  records  occurred  after  the  king's  mandamus  had  l)een 
received,  releasing  Friends  from  prison.  I  will  read  a  verse 
or  two  of  it. 

"  So  the  door  of  the  jail  was  open  cast, 

And  like  Daniel  out  of  the  lion's  den, 
Tender  youth  and  girlhood  passed. 

With  age-bowed  women  and  grey-locked  men. 
And  the  voice  of  one  appointed  to  die, 
Was  lifted  in  praise  and  thanks  on  high  ; 
And  the  little  maid  from  New  Netherlands, 
Kissed,  in  her  joy,  the  doomed  man's  hands. 

"  And  one,  whose  call  was  to  minister 

To  the  souls  in  prison,  beside  him  went. 
An  ancient  woman,  bearing  with  her 

The  linen  shroud  for  his  burial  meant. 
For  she,  not  counting  her  own  life  dear, 
In  the  strength  of  a  love  that  cast  out  fear. 
Had  watched  and  served  where  her  brethren  died. 
Like  those  who  waited  the  Cross  beside. 

"  The  autumn  haze  lay  soft  and  still 

On  wood  and  meadow  and  uj^land  farms  ; 
On  the  brow  of  Snow  Hill  the  great  windmill 

Slowly  and  lazily  swung  its  arms ; 
Broad  in  the  sunshine  stretched  away. 
With  its  capes  and  islands,  the  turquoise  bay ; 
And  over  water  and  dusk  of  pines. 
Blue  hills  lifted  their  faint  outlines. 

"  The  topaz  leaves  of  the  walnut  glowed. 
The  sumach  added  its  crimson  fleck, 
.\nd  double  in  air  and  water  showed 
The  tinted  maples  along  the  Neck  ; 


^ 


ri 


i  J 


/ 


ai 


Through  frost-flower  clusters  of  pale  star-mist, 
And  gentian  fringes  of  amethyst. 
And  royal  plumes  of  the  golden  rod, 
The  grazing  cattle  on  Gentry  trod. 

"  But  as  they  who  see  not,  the  Quakers  saw 
The  world  about  them  ;  they  only  thought 
With  deep  thanksgiving  and  pious  awe, 

Of  the  great  deliverance  God  had  wrought." 

Time  works  great  changes,  and  it  is  an  interesting  fact,  that 
the  historian  Bancroft,  born  in  Massachusetts,  writing  in 
Boston,  should  put  in  Boston  type,  on  Boston  paper,  these 
words:  "  The  rise  of  the  people  called  Quakers  is  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  events  in  the  history  of  man.  It  marks  the 
moment  when  intellectual  freedom  was  claimed  uncondition- 
ally by  the  people  as  an  inalienable  birthright.  *  =^  * 
The  Quaker  doctrine  is  philosophy  summoned  from  the  closet, 
the  college,  the  saloon,  and  planted  among  the  most  despised 
of  the  people."^ 

Surely  the  blood  shed  on  Boston  Common  was  not  shed 
there  in  vain. 

The  visit  of  George  Fox  to  this  country  strengthened  the 
desire  which  had  long  rested  on  his  mind,  that  a  territory 
might  be  owned  in  America  by  Friends,  where  those  who 
wished  to  do  so  might  remove  with  their  families,  where  they 
could  worship  God  without  molestation,  and  where  their 
children  might  have  the  proper  social  surroundings. 

So  early,  indeed,  as  in  the  year  1660,  an  attempt  was  made, 
at  Fox's  suggestion,  and  with  the  aid  of  Josiah  Cole,  a  well- 
known  Friend,  to  purchase  a  territory  of  the  Susquehanna  In- 
dians.-^  This  failed  because  of  the  tribal  wars  among  the  Indians. 
It  is  an  interesting  fact,  as  suggested  to  me  a  few  days  since 
by  Frederick  D.  Stone,  of  this  city,  that  this  tract  of  land, 
lying  as  it  does  along  the  Susquehanna  river,  just  north  of  the 
Maryland  line,  twenty  years  later  became  the  property  of 
Penn,  and  has  since  been  a  part  of  the  Quaker  settlement. 

From  Maine  to  Florida  the  coast  was  either  colonized  or 

^History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  2,  p.  ^^"j . 

-  For  correspondence  on  this  subject,  see   Bowdcns  History  of  Friends 
in  America,  Vol.  i,p.  389. 


rii  *t.-^f'\Mt     .A< 


:i2 


claimed,  and  it  was  not  until  Lord  John  Rerkely  offered  for 
sale  his  interest  in  New  Jersey,  that  an  opportunity  was  afforded 
Friends  to  make  such  a  purchase  as  they  had  long  desired. 
This  opportunity  was  eagerly  seized  upon  by  Edward  Byllinge 
and  John  Fen  wick,  both  of  whom  belonged  to  the  Society  of 
Friends,  but  who,  in  this  matter,  acted  in  their  individual 
( apacity.  Disagreements  occurring  between  these  two,  Wil- 
liam Penn  kindly  consented  to  act  as  arbitrator.  The  dispute 
having  been  settled,  John  Fen  wick  sailed  for  the  new  world. 
Pecuniary  embarrassments  occurring  to  Byllinge,  he  trans 
ferred  to  his  creditors  his  interest  in  New  Jersey.  Again  the 
aid  of  William  Penn  was  sought,  and  now  he  consented  to 
act  as  joint  trustee  with  two  of  Byllinge's  creditors  in  the  New 
Jersey  estate,  and  thus  for  the  first  time  became  personally 
engaged  in  the  establishment  of  an  American  colony.  It 
is  quite  probable  that  William  Penn's  connection  with  the 
affairs  of  New  Jersey  determined  the  establishment  of  this 
Province  by  him  ten  years  later.  It  is  true  that  a  regard  for 
the  aborigines  of  America  and  a  desire  to  do  something  for 
their  welfare  had  long  occupied  his  mind.  '•  I  had  an  open- 
ing of  joy  as  to  these  parts,"  he  writes,  ''  in  the  year  1661." 
This  interest  was  deepened  by  his  acquaintance  with  the 
affairs  of  the  country  as  trustee  for  Byllinge,  by  his  association 
with  Barclay,  even  before  the  latter  became  Governor  of  East 
Jersey,  by  his  conferences  with  George  Fox,  and  by  his  desire 
himself  to  found  a  colony  where  freedom  of  conscience  should 
be  regarded  as  the  inherent  right  of  every  citizen.  Mark,  my 
friends,  not  should  be  tolerated,  but  should  be  regarded  ;is  the 
inherent  right  of  every  citizen.' 

'  In  his  address  to  Friends  and  others,  projxjsing  to  remove  to  New 
Jersey,  William  Penn,  instead  of  holding  out  any  undue  inducements,  uses 
this  remarkable  language  :  "  In  whomsoever  a  desire  is  to  be  concerned 
in  this  intended  plantation,  such  should  weigh  the  thing  before  the  Lord, 
and  not  rashly  conclude  on  any  such  remove,  and  that  they  do  not  offer 
violence  to  the  tender  love  of  their  near  kindred  and  relations,  but  soberly 
and  conscientiously  endeavor  to  obtain  their  good  wills,  the  unity  of 
Friends  where  they  live,  that  whether  they  go  or  stay,  it  may  be  of  good 
favor  before  the  Lord,  (and  good  people),  from  whom  alone  can  all 
heavenly  and  earthly  blessings  come.  This  am  I,  William  Penn,  moved 
of  the  Lord  to  write  unto  you  lest  any  bring  a  temptation  upon  themselves 


I 


> 


r     r 


33 

We  owe,  in  great  measure,  to  William  Penn  the  establish- 
ment of  this  great  principle,  which  is  now  an  integral  part  of 
our  national  Constitution.^  We  owe  to  Penn  and  to  his  asso- 
ciates of  New  Jersey,  the  protest  against  protracted  imprison- 
ment for  debt.^  We  owe  to  them  also  the  assertion  that  no 
tax  should  be  levied  on  a  people  without  their  consent.^  We 
owe  to  Penn  the  suggestions  for  a  union  of  the  American 
Colonies,  which  were  first  made  by  him  in  the  year  1697.* 

I  shall  not  detain  you  by  repeating  what  the  Bi-Centennial 
anniversary  has  made  so  familiar,  in  the  early  history  of  Wil- 
liam Penn.  Contemporary  history  often  fails  to  do  justice  to 
its  subject,  but  Thomas  Story,  himself  a  gentleman  by  birth 
and  education,  brought  up  to  the  bar,  the  first  Recorder  of 
Philadelphia,  Master  of  the  Rolls,  and  an  eminent  preacher 
among  Friends,  under  date  of  London,  1694,  thus  writes: 
''What  added  much  to  my  encouragement,  was  the  fatherly 
care  and  behavior  of  the  ministers  in  general,  but  especially 
of  that  great  minister  of  the  gospel,  and  faithful  servant  of 
Christ,   William  Penn,  who  abounded  in  wisdom,  discretion, 

or  others,  and  in  offending  the  Lord  slay  their  own  peace.  Blessed  are 
they  that  can  see,  and  behold  Him,  their  leader,  their  orderer,  their  con- 
ductor and  preserver,  in  staying  or  in  going.  Whose  is  the  earth  and  the 
fulness  thereof,  and  the  cattle  upon  a  thousand  hills." 

In  Smith's  History  of  New  Jersey,  there  is  a  letter  from  Dr.  Daniel 
Wills  to  his  "  near^and  ancient  acquaintance  William  and  Sarah  Biddle,'" 
in  which,  with  the  same  spirit  of  caution,  struggling  against  his  wishes,  he 
writes :  "  Now  my  near  and  ancient  acquaintance,  William  and  Sarah 
Biddle,  my  love  you  may  feel  beyond  expression ;  and  if  you  have  clear- 
ness to  come  to  New  Jersey,  let  nothing  hinder ;  but  if  you  have  a  stop 
within  yourselves,  let  not  anything  farther  you  until  the  way  clears  to  your 
full  satisfaction.  In  this  advice  I  deny  myself;  if  I  might  I  would  for- 
ward you  to  the  utmost."  And  then  the  writer  adds,  as  if  he  must  say  it, 
•'  If  a  man  cannot  live  here,  I  believe  he  can    hardly  live  in  any  place  in 

the  world." 

His  "  ancient  acquaintance"  did  have  a  clearness  to  come,  and  they 
came.  Two  centuries  of  their  descendants,  men  active  in  all  those  good 
works  which  promote  the  welfare  of  the  State,  have  shown  that  William 
and  Sarah  Biddle  did  not  mistake  the  pointings  of  the  Divine  Finger. 

1  See  Concessions  and  Agreements  of  Proprietors  of  West  Jersey. 

"^  Ibid.  Ubid. 

*  Contributions  to  American  History  ;  Penna.  Hist.  Soc,  vol.  6,  p.  264. 

5 


34 


35 


prudence,  love  and  tenderness,  of  affection,  witli  all  sincerity, 
above  most  in  this  generation,  and,  indeed,  I  never  knew  his 
equal." 

Those  of  you  who  may  be  interested  in  the  further  study  of 
the  men  who  gave  stability  to  our  colonial  government  will 
find  in  the  Philadelphia  "Friend,"  Vols.  27th  to  35th,  in- 
clusive, very  full  and  interesting  notices  of  many  of  them. 
'I'hey  are  written  by  the  late  Nathan  Kite,  and  must  have  re- 
quired great  research  for  their  preparation. 

The  second  voyage  of  William  Penn,  though  not  attended 
with  illness,  was,  fortunately,  a  long  one,  for  had  he  arrived  at 
the  time  he  was  expected  he  would  have  found  prevailing  in 
Philadelphia  a  fearful  epidemic  of  yellow  fever.  It  is  an  in- 
teresting fiut  that  for  a  correct  history  of  the  yellow  fever  of 
1699,  the  medical  profession  and  the  community  are  indebted 
to  a  non-professional  writer,  'I'homas  Story,  who,  though  en- 
gaged in  religious  service  here,  has  left  a  graphic  sketch  of 
this  terrible  pestilence. 

Antl  now,  in  (losing  my  lecture,  I  wish  to  say  that,  in  pre- 
paring it,  I  have  been  agreeably  surprised  at  the  richness  of 
the  field  into  which  it  ha<  U'd  me  and  the  abund.in(e  of 
material  to  be  found  there. 

While  I  am  well  aware  how  imperfectly  I  have  brought  this 
material  before  you,  I  must  say,  in  my  own  behalf,  that  I  have 
been  obliged  to  turn  aside  from  many  tempting  paths  of  re- 
search, and  have  been  compelled  to  omit  many  pages  of  what 
I  had  written  lest  1  should  encroach  unduly  on  your  time  and 
patience.  The  literature  of  the  early  Friends  is  amazing  in 
its  extent  ;  how  they  ever  found  time  to  write  and  to  ])rint  so 
much  I  cannot  understand.  Here  is  George  P'ox's  folio  jour- 
nal of  nearly  seven  hundred  |)ages.  Here  are  selections  from 
William  Penn's  writings,  a  folio  of  more  than  eight  hundred 
pages.  Indeed  the  theme,  "William  Penn  as  an  author," 
would  make  a  longer  lecture  than  1  have  given  you  this  evening. 
The  journal  of  Thomas  Story,  a  folio  of  six  hundred  pages, 
is  written  with  great  force  and  beauty  of  style,  and  the  life  of 
Thomas  Ellwood  is  one  of  those  bright  pictures  of  home-life 
in  the  17th  Century,  at  the  house  of  Isaac  Penington,  which 
is  both  interesting  and  instructive. 


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Ellwood  was  tutor  to  Penington's  children,  and  at  one  time 
was  reader  to  the  blind  poet,  John  Milton.  It  seems  to  bring 
those  times  pretty  closely  home  to  students  of  this  day  to  read 
that  Milton  had  learned  the  Continental  pronunciation  of 
Latin,  and  Ellwood  the  English,  and  that  the  same  confusion 
which  exists  nowadays  on  this  account  obtained  two  centuries 
ago.  These  and  many  other  matters  may  be  found  in  the 
literature  of  the  early  Friends,  and  while  I  am  content  to  leave 
out  of  my  recommendation  their  purely  controversial  works, 
I  cannot  do  better  than  bid  you,  in  the  language  of  Charles 
Lamb,  get  their  history  by  heart  and  "  love  the  early  Quakers." 

There  are  many  lessons  to  be  learned  from  what  we  have 
been  considering  this  evening,  but  there  is  one  which  I  think 
must  commend  itself  to  all  of  us.  It  is  that  we  should  be 
charitable  in  our  judgment  of  the  religious  opinions  of  others 
however  much  they  may  differ  from  our  own,  when  those  who 
hold  them  show,  by  their  daily  life,  that  they  are  sincere  in 
their  belief,  however  erroneous  we  may  deem  it. 

The  longer  I  live  and  the  more  my  daily  duties  bring  me 
in  association  with  my  fellows — of  almost  every  religious  sect 
— the  more  do  I  find  in  them  of  sympathy  for  suffering,  of 
readine.ss  to  help  the  afflicted,  and  to  reclaim  the  erring,  of 
those  good  qualities  of  the  heart  which  form  a  common  plat- 
form to  meet  upon  ;  and  every  year's  experience  convinces 
me  that  did  good  people  know  each  other  more  they  would 
like  each  other  more,  and  judge  each  other  more  kindly. 

It  would  have  been  difficult  to  offer  to  the  English  people 
of  the  17th  Century — as  they  understood  them — any  doctrines 
more  opposed  to  the  prevailing  belief,  than  were  some  of  those 
of  the  early  Friends  ;  and  yet  the  faithfulness  of  these  Friends, 
their  undoubted  sincerity,  their  exemplary  lives,  and  the  fact 
that  these  doctrines  had  the  Divine  approval,  wrought  their 
slow  but  sure  acceptance. 

This  charity  need  involve  no  disloyalty  to  convictions  of 
our  own  duty.  It  is  the  kindly  judging  of  the  motives  and 
even  of  the  acts  themselves,  rather  than  the  approval  of  those 
acts,  which  it  implies. 

The  late  Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley,   Dean  of  Westminster, 


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36 

in  one  of  his  latest  poems,  has  largely  recognized  this  truth. 
Writing  of  the  higher  life  beyond  this,  and  what  we  may  hope 
to  find  there,  he  says  :  » 

"  There  may  we,  rejoicing  meet 

Loved  and  Lost,  our  heart's  best  treasures, 
Not  without  surprises  sweet, 

Mount  with  them  to  loftier  pleasures. 
Though  the  earthly  bond  be  gone. 
Yet  the  spirits  still  are  one, 
One  in  love,  and  hope,  and  faith, 
One  in  all  that  conquers  death." 

"  And  in  those  celestial  spheres. 

Shall  not  then  our  keener  vision, 
See,  athwart  the  mist  of  years, 

Through  the  barriers  of  division, 
Holy  soul  and  noble  mind, 
From  their  baser  dross  refined. 
Heroes  in  the  better  land, 
Whom  below  we  scorned  or  banned." 


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